Under-active composers- Page 2
Under-active composers
#25Under-active composers
Posted: 5/8/16 at 1:51pm
Thank you for responding. I'm a huge fan of your work and it's so sad to hear that The Princess Bride didn't work out. I hope to hear more from you soon!
#26Under-active composers
Posted: 5/8/16 at 2:04pm
I'm surprised no one has mentioned Steven Schwartz...Wicked was 12 years ago! At Wall to Wall Steven Schwartz at Symphony Space a few weeks ago they performed a few songs from works in progress (Houdini, Schickaneder, My Son Pinocchio and My Fairy Tale) but I wasn't there for that part of the concert.
#27Under-active composers
Posted: 5/8/16 at 2:37pm
Wow, Mr. Guettel, what a class act. Thanks for updating us.
#28Under-active composers
Posted: 5/8/16 at 4:02pm
After Eight said: "I wish Burt Bacharach and Mark Sandrich, Jr. had composed music for Broadway more than once. I loved the scores for Promises, Promises and Ben Franklin in Paris. The latter was a musical about a historical figure that one could actually enjoy!
"
I agree. Unfortunately PP nearly gave Bacharach a nervous breakdown. He also hated the nature of live musicals in that he couldn't guarantee the sound and orchestra and performances were perfect night after night. He seems to be more interested in it again now, didn't he have a show on San Diego a few years back?
I wish Jimmy Webb would finally get a Broadway show. His books on songwriting show his love for musicals and that he clearly gets the difference between pop and stage writing. He's had a few regional shows--notably a well received adaptation of Bradbury's Dandelion Wine. He was also a fave of Michael Bennett's. They worked on the performance project The Children's Crusade. And notably they worked in Scandal, the sex musical that was workshopped with Swoozie Kurtz and everyone has called brilliant but Bennett abruptly ended when he got ill for understandable reasons (prob not the best time to do a sex positive musical). Still I think it's about time they do a charity concert or something of that.
#29Under-active composers
Posted: 5/8/16 at 4:21pm
Bacharach just did New York Animals off Broadway. My friend and composer was in it.
#30Under-active composers
Posted: 5/8/16 at 5:16pm
Adam Guettel2 said: "Hey good people of this Broadway World thread,
I know it appears that I have fallen off the face of the earth, but I'm still writing away. I've completed a first draft of MILLIONS, due for another workshop in August/September. Craig Lucas and I are half way through writing another show together (because of rights issues I can't mention the title yet) and I am well into a draft of an opera for Houston Grand Opera scheduled for their 2020 season. No one is more chagrined than I about not having had anything new on the boards since Piazza. But I can't help but mention that I had done all the music for Princess Bride in 2007 when it blew up and died. So, that score sits in a drawer awaiting the right romantic fairy tale to use it in. (The overture was played at Carnegie Hall 2 weeks ago.) I had to post today because I love this work and the community too much to let people think I had stopped writing. Whether my new work will be any good in front of a paying audience - well, I hope I have a chance to find out! "
How wonderful and unexpected that you responded! I hope you know that all the mentions of your career in this thread are just because people have loved your work so much and are ready to hear so much more. I'm also among those heartbroken that Princess Bride didn't work out, as you seem such a perfect fit for the material. I'm sure the score you wrote is beautiful.
I look forward to whatever you put out next!
#31Under-active composers
Posted: 5/8/16 at 5:16pm
We all love and miss you Adam Guettel!
"Contentment, it seems, simply happens. It appears accompanied by no bravos and no tears."
BroadMagTech
Broadway Star Joined: 5/9/15
#32Under-active composers
Posted: 5/8/16 at 5:43pm
I can't wait to see what you come up with next
All the best!
#33Under-active composers
Posted: 5/8/16 at 6:19pm
Boublil and Schonberg are currently reworking Martin Guerre in an attempt to make it not a flop.
https://www.broadwayworld.com/article/Alain-Boublil-Claude-Michel-Schonberg-Reworking-MARTIN-GUERRE-Seeking-Opera-House-Premiere-20160429
They're getting up there as far as age goes too, though, and I'm not sure they're going to ever create another show.
#34Under-active composers
Posted: 5/8/16 at 11:03pm
How kind of Mr. Guettel to respond!
I think he is the finest composer of his generation. (Though BRIDGES has pushed Jason Robert Brown to a very close second, in my view.)
#35Under-active composers
Posted: 5/9/16 at 12:08am
John Bucchino!
"This thread reads like a series of White House memos." — Mister Matt
broadwayboy223
Broadway Legend Joined: 7/2/14
#36Under-active composers
Posted: 5/9/16 at 1:23am
Thank you so much for posting Mr. Guettel! I hope we can hear your score for Princess Bride one day!! I'm sure it's beautiful.
#37Under-active composers
Posted: 5/9/16 at 5:15am
My all time favourite score is Urinetown so I'd love to see a new show from Greg Kotis and Mark Hollmann. I know they had that show about yeast a few years ago that went under the radar a bit and it was announced they were working on a project with Bob Martin too, but I just want the shows now!
#38Under-active composers
Posted: 5/9/16 at 6:02am
Hi Mr Guettel, I feel very honoured that you took the time to update us. I for one drool at the prospect of one day hearing your Princess Bride music in some context- so sad it never reached the stage. Knowing that 'if you rush a miracle man you get rotten miracles', I'll just wait patiently till the next show arrives.
Good luck with all your projects!
Mr Roxy
Broadway Legend Joined: 5/17/03
#39Under-active composers
Posted: 5/9/16 at 9:43am
An early post mentioned Larry Grossman.After a string of flops, he may have decided it was simply to frustrating trying for the golden ring and he just walked away from it. That has happened to a few. The composing team of The Yearling worked on it for awhile so to see it crash and burn after all their sweat and tears maybe was to much for them and they gave up . What a pity.
Poster Emeritus
Updated On: 5/9/16 at 09:43 AM
#40Under-active composers
Posted: 5/9/16 at 11:06am
For years, I thought it was too bad that Douglas Cohen (No Way To Treat A Lady) never got a chance to write the score for a major commercial project. But if you review the list of other Richard Rodgers Award winners, you'll find that most of the names are entirely unknown to the public. Writing for musical theatre is not much of a career for 99.9% of those who strive for it.
I would have liked to have seen Yeston and Finn turn out a new show every 3 or 4 years, but there's just not enough demand. Other teams who have only had one commercial project produced in NYC thus far, and from whom I'd like to hear more, are Kotis/Hollman, Frankel/Korie, and Lambert/Morrison.
#41Under-active composers
Posted: 5/9/16 at 11:15am
newintown said: "For years, I thought it was too bad that Douglas Cohen (No Way To Treat A Lady) never got a chance to write the score for a major commercial project.
He tried -- with The Opposite of Sex, based on the Don Roos film, which developed for much of the early-to-mid-2000s but never made it to New York. A shame, since it was better than most musicals that end up on Broadway.
"You travel alone because other people are only there to remind you how much that hook hurts that we all bit down on. Wait for that one day we can bite free and get back out there in space where we belong, sail back over water, over skies, into space, the hook finally out of our mouths and we wander back out there in space spawning to other planets never to return hurrah to earth and we'll look back and can't even see these lives here anymore. Only the taste of blood to remind us we ever existed. The earth is small. We're gone. We're dead. We're safe."
-John Guare, Landscape of the Body
#42Under-active composers
Posted: 5/9/16 at 11:43am
Douglas Cohen has actually written 15 shows to date.
....but the world goes 'round
#43Under-active composers
Posted: 5/9/16 at 11:58am
Yes, he has - none of them commercial NYC projects, as noted above.
#44Under-active composers
Posted: 5/9/16 at 12:16pm
David Yazbek, please! I can't get enough of The Full Monty and Dirty Rotten Scoundrels scores.
#45Under-active composers
Posted: 5/9/16 at 12:22pm
newintown said: "Yes, he has - none of them commercial NYC projects, as noted above.
"
Are we discussing composers whose work is not presented in NY, or composers who don't work enough?
....but the world goes 'round
Updated On: 5/9/16 at 12:22 PM
mamaleh
Broadway Legend Joined: 5/11/04
#46Under-active composers
Posted: 5/9/16 at 12:26pm
I always wondered why the late Marian Grudeff & Ray Jessel were not more prolific in the years following BAKER STREET, the first musical I ever saw (on a class trip). I know it did not turn a profit, but I liked, and still like, that score. Wish they'd plunged in more often.
Updated On: 5/9/16 at 12:26 PM
Mr Roxy
Broadway Legend Joined: 5/17/03
#47Under-active composers
Posted: 5/9/16 at 2:19pm
They had a Barnum musical written but it never saw the light of day. One of the best opening songs setting the tone of a musical was "It's So Simple ."
Poster Emeritus
Updated On: 5/9/16 at 02:19 PM
#48Under-active composers
Posted: 5/9/16 at 7:04pm
In the past, once people made a breakthrough, they seemed to get produced fairly regularly. Now it seems to be the era of the one hit wonder (or one flop) in the majority of cases.
jo
Broadway Legend Joined: 5/15/03
#49Under-active composers
Posted: 5/9/16 at 7:23pm
Mr Roxy said: "They had a Barnum musical written but it never saw the light of day. One of the best opening songs setting the tone of a musical was "It's So Simple ."
"
I didn't know that a previous attempt at musicalizing the life of Barnum has been done before. I am only familiar with the work of Coleman, Stewart and Bramble.
It is interesting that a rising duo of composers, Pasek and Paul, will provide the musical score for the new movie musical GREATEST SHOWMAN ON EARTH which centers on the life of P.T. Barnum ( set for Christmas Day release in 2017).
